The Past Haunts
by OnceUponASunsetDream
Summary: Sherlock never really spoke about his past and John didn't ask, this case however, might show John more of his friend than he ever really wanted to see. No pairings. Child abuse, domestic violence warnings.


This will be my second Sherlock story now but my first could use some more editing that I will eventually get around to. I read a few in this…genre before and had a good idea. I think that Sherlock's personality cannot be explained by mere genius. He appears to have some…other issues I s'pose you could say so here's a possibility.

OOOOOO

John sighed sadly as he observed the boy sitting on the other side of the one way mirror, staring blankly his hands clenched tightly before him on the plain table. The boy was young, ten years old, he shouldn't have that haunted look in his wide green eyes. Aiden Miller wore a too large sweatshirt, the sleeved covering his hands and a pair of old jeans, ripped in the hems and blood on the knees and across the bottom of his jacket. The boy had been found in the kitchen of his home, kneeling beside his mother's dead and broken body, a small saucepan beside him and his father's unconscious form on the ground near the sink.

A neighbour had called the police when she had heard screams from the Miller house and when the police arrived on the scene and found young Aiden kneeling in his mother's blood with tears on his cheeks and his father slumped in a heap not far away they had called in forensics and sent the child off to the paramedics who had checked the boy over for injuries and then wrapped him in a shock blanket. DI Lestrade had called for Sherlock and John who arrived at the scene about half and hour after the police, just before the shock was began to wear off the boy. Sherlock had deduced what happened between the mother and father and what role Aiden played in the incident. Sherlock had surprised them all by going to sit beside the boy in the back of the ambulance and wrapped an arm around the small shoulders and let Aiden cry into his side.

Aiden had been brought down to the station for his version of events and the father was arrested and brought to a separate interrogating room. Donovan had been gently questioning the ten year old for the past twenty minutes and not got a word out of him. Lestrade called her back into the observing room and turned to John. "Do you want a go?" he asked.

Before John could reply Sherlock spoke up. He hadn't said a word to anyone except Aiden when the child was crying on his shirt and had watched the boy through the one way mirror with a set and pale face. "Can I speak with him? I can get him to talk." he murmured, wrenching his eyes off the boy to look at Lestrade who looked frankly shocked.

He shared a loaded look with John and then nodded reluctantly, ignoring Donovan's angry cry from beside him but Lestrade nodded reluctantly. "OK, you can talk to the kid, but if you set one toe out of line, if you are too harsh, I'll send Donovan in to remove you. Agreed?"

Sherlock nodded, looking like he was about to walk into a battle he knew he would lose, not even reacting to Donovan's outraged hissing, _'You're letting the_ Freak _in to talk to a_ traumatised_ kid!?_'

Sherlock left the room and John watched beside Lestrade and Donovan as Sherlock quietly entered the room they could see through the glass. Sherlock sat at the other chair, opposite Aiden and looked down at his own clasped hands. "Hello." he said softly.

Aiden looked up at him through his dark lashes and nodded jerkily, sending his chestnut hair flying. "Hello." he replied in a voice barely above a murmur.

"I know what your dad did to you." Sherlock announced suddenly but gently after a long pause. Aiden's head rose but he didn't say a word, face paling. Lestrade made a short abortive movement towards the door but seemed transfixed by the look on Sherlock's face. He looked heartbroken and just as scared as the kid. "He hurt you didn't he?"

Aiden searched Sherlock's grey eyes frantically and nodded faintly, John could hear Donovan's intake of breath and furious scribbling on her notepad, no doubt adding child abuse to the charges against Mr Miller. "Yes." Aiden breathed. "How did you know?"

Sherlock looked up at t he camera he knew was there and smiled without humour. "I know how to recognise the signs better than most others." he replied just as softly. John frowned, what did that mean? Sherlock unclasped his hands but kept them on the table, holding one palm up towards Aiden, "May I?"

Aiden drew back slightly but then nodded, reaching his own arm slowly across the table. Sherlock took the limb with extreme care and very slowly and gently pushed back the long sleeve of the jumper to reveal large blossoming black, purple and sickly green bruises. John looked away, eyes welling, how could anyone do this to a child? Lestrade had his hands fisted at his side and Donovan was staring at the scene before them with a hand over her mouth. Sherlock was gently running his fingers over the bruises and holding the thin wrist as though it would snap if he held too tight.

"You know what it's like, don't you?" Aiden announced suddenly into the silence and John's head snapped up, dear God no.

Sherlock paused, eyes flitting to the glass wall where he knew they were watching. "Yes. My father never wanted a second son. One was good enough for him."

Aiden nodded sadly. "My big brother died." he revealed softly. "He was very, very sick. He had cancer." Sherlock wiped a stray tear tenderly from the rosy cheek and clasped the small hands in his own. "Dad started drinking when the doctors said James was going to go away soon and Mum cried all the time. Dad said it was my fault that James had cancer and maybe if I hurt more than him, I would die instead."

Donovan now had tears rolling silently down her cheeks, John could feel them burning in his own eyes and Lestrade was shaking with rage. "Mum was too upset to notice and Dad said that if I told her, he'd kill her too."

"But she found out on her own didn't she?" Sherlock prodded gently.

Aiden nodded, "She was out and Dad started...well and she came home early and saw what he was doing and he got angry and he grabbed a knife and he...and he...he." Aiden, whose voice had risen and sped up in his hysteria stuttered off into great gasps and Sherlock ran his thumbs over the back of the small hands, his eyes wet and wide with understanding. Aiden took a deep shuddering breath and squeezed Sherlock's hands tightly. "I-I-I grabbed the saucepan off the sink and I-I hit him on the head and he dropped the knife so I hit him again and he fell onto the sink and fell down. I sat next to Mum but she wasn't moving and I just went...blank." Aiden was whispering now and he looked so desperately lost and that was such a heartbreaking look on such a young child.

Sherlock took a deep breath and John knew exactly what was going to happen in the next few moments. "My father never made it secret that he didn't like me but he restrained himself to harsh words and names for years. Mummy got him to stop a fair bit of it and Mycroft, my brother, protected me from most of what Mummy missed. I never had a good grasp of other people or emotions and Father used that as an excuse to call me things."

"What did he call you?" Aiden asked. "Dad called me a burden and once he said I was a murderer."

"Freak mostly." Sherlock answered and Sally gave a tiny cry of horror from behind her hands pressed to her mouth. "Or a mistake and other not so polite names." Sherlock smiled slightly at the boy and squeezed his hands softly. "Maybe I'll tell you when you're older."

"Did your brother die too?" Aiden asked innocently.

Sherlock shook his head. "No, no he's still alive and just as interfering as ever." Sherlock said with a roll of his eyes that made Aiden giggle faintly. "No Mummy went overseas for two months on a business trip and father snapped, I think, once he had one too many drinks. I was eight and Mycroft was fifteen. When he was eleven he was sent to attend a boarding school that all the boys in our family attend and he wasn't due back for three weeks. Father used that time...to his advantage."

"He hurt you?" Aiden asked in a hushed voice.

Sherlock nodded. "Yes quite a lot."

"More than my Dad hurt me?"

Another nod. "Yes. Father had a lot of pent up rage towards me and...well those three weeks almost killed me. When Mycroft came home he found me locked in the cellar with a bowl of water and a loaf of stale bread. He called a doctor and made sure he could be kept silent and then he barricaded the two of us in the west wing of the house and had the servants bring us food."

"Servants? Were you rich? Like Batman?"

Sherlock let a startled laugh past his lips and shook his head. "Yes we were rich and lived in a manor but unfortunately not like Batman."

Sherlock rubbed the boy's small hands again and took another deep breath, eyes darting to the glass again before flicking away as if ashamed. "When Mummy came home none of us said a word, she had gotten a disease from Africa and was very sick. Mycroft very reluctantly went back to school and I became Mummy's shadow. About two weeks later Mummy sent me to get her a cup of tea and Father caught me in the hallway outside her room. He beat me and I dropped the cup. It smashed on the floor and Father shoved my back into the shards of china.

"Mummy heard the noise and came to investigate. She saw Father kick me and tried to intervene. She shoved Father off me and they began to fight, she yelled at him that she would divorce him and he'd never see his children again. He advanced towards her and she backed away." Sherlock's voice was faint and his eyes distant as he remembered. John leaned against the glass for support, his eyes dripping slow tears, Sally had retreated to the opposite wall and slid down it, her hands pressed against her face and her shoulders shaking with silent sobs, guilt beginning to eat at her. Lestrade stood tall before the glass, hands fisted at his sides, body shaking with rage and eyes wet but his face dry.

Mummy was weak due to her illness and when Father pushed her she fell down the staircase to the entrance hall. She must have died immediately. I fell unconscious not long after. The servants called the police and Father was sentenced to jail for abuse and murder. Mycroft and I went to live with our Grandmére in Paris and Mycroft moved out when he was twenty two. I stayed in Paris until I was eighteen then moved to London and began working on crime scenes."

Aiden slid out of his seat, rounded the table and climbed into Sherlock's lap and wrapped his arms around the detective. Sherlock stiffened but gently wrapped his arms around the boy. "What are you doing?" Sherlock asked, sound both awkward and weary.

"Giving you a hug." The boy said firmly. "You need one."

Sherlock blinked but pulled the boy closer and sunk back into his chair closing his eyes as Aiden's own eyes closed. "Will I go live with my Gran?" the child asked.

Sherlock shrugged. "Maybe, it depends what your mother wanted."

"I like Gran but we don't see her much."

Sherlock merely hummed and John watched as a traumatised child dragged more personality and memories out of his best friend than he has seen in the man in the whole year he had known him. He always knew that Sherlock was a complicated man but this was extreme. There were more layers to the Consulting Detective than he had ever imagined and the sad thing was that John doubted that he ever would find them all.

OOOOOO

So what'd you think? I'm still not really sure but R&R please.


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